The comic artwork of Ryan Claytor.

| Up to 20% Off🔥 |. Low Cost. Pill Shop, Cheap Prices. Free samples for all orders. see,Friendly Support 24/7 And Best Offers!. Welcome back to another Small Press Professionalism post. Last week we discussed a few tips on actually shooting your product photography. This week we’ll continue that discussion as we move into some tips on digitally altering your photographs. For this post I am going to assume that you have access to Adobe Photoshop, as it is the industry standard for retooling your photographs. If you don’t own this program, there are likely adult education facilities or community college classes in your area that will allow you to use Adobe Photoshop. There are even free photoshop alternatives available. However, for these tutorials I’ll be using Adobe Photoshop. Let’s jump into a 5 different ways you can start making your product photography look even better.

Purchase Discount Medication! Cialis Price Local Pharmacy. Fastest Shipping, Lexapro Generic Markings. Due to the length of this post, here are a few jump links to each of the 5 different sub-sections:

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When you start digitally manipulating your product photography, it’s a good idea to keep the resolution high while you’re working. In other words, do not resize your image before you start changing it, just leave it the resolution that it came out of your camera. Eventually you will resize your photographs (see tip #5 in this article), but we won’t even think about doing that until the end. The reason for that is two-fold: working at the highest possible resolution ensures a better quality image and when we finally do resize, it will allow for an greater margin of error.

First, higher resolution means greater image quality. It’s true, you will want multiple different sizes of your product photography (low resolution for web images, high resolution images suitable for print [that you will make available to newspapers, magazines, and other print publications via your press releases]). However, if you downsize your image initially (in order to make the file size smaller and easier to work with), there is NO WAY you can upsize your image after you are done processing it. It will just look blurry. Here’s an example of a single image that was kept at print-resolution from the beginning (left) compared with an image that was downsized initially, then upsized in an attempt to create a print-resolution file (right…but wrong). Please click the image to enlarge.

This may seem like a rudimentary concept, but I see it happening far too frequently. A common reason photoshop amateurs downsize images prior to working on them is because the image appears VERY LARGE and they just want to “make it smaller.” However, instead of changing the physical size of your image, you can “zoom out” of your file without changing the image’s physical size. Simply use the zoom tool at the bottom of the tool bar.

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Chances are, you’ll likely need to adjust the levels of your photograph. Professional photography displays a full range of values (from the blackest black to the whitest white and a good mix of shades in between). Despite our best efforts to achieve this through the use of adequate lighting, usually we end-up with an image that does not have those extreme values (dark blacks and light whites). The resulting image is one that appears dingy, muddy, and in a bit of a haze. In this next comparison, we can see the before image prior to level adjustment and the after image following a simple modification:

Levels are a handy menu item that can be found via the Image Menu -> Adjustments -> Levels.

The resulting dialogue box will look something like this:

Now, to the untrained eye, this may look big and scary. However, we’re only going to focus on that bell curve in the middle of the dialogue box.

So what does that wacky graph mean, exactly? Well, if you look at the bottom of the histogram (the fancy term for that central graph), you’ll see there are three tiny arrows (Black [left], Grey [middle], White [right]). These three pointers correspond with the image’s darkest values (black arrow), mid-tones (grey arrow), and lightest values (white arrow). The histogram shows you how many of each value are present in your image. So, from this histogram you can see that there are very few black blacks and almost no white whites. The majority of the value information is concentrated in the middle, or the mid-tones. If you have an image comprised predominantly of mid-tones, that means you’ll have a photograph that looks dingy, muddy, and in a bit of a haze, just like the image I started with.

But fear not! We’ll be able to de-fog this image simply by poking those arrows around, and our strategy is pretty simple. Let’s think about this for a moment. If we don’t have any dark blacks in our photo (as is evident from the lack of value information on the left side of our histogram), just move that black arrow to the right until you start to see a rise in value info. Do the same thing for the white arrow; pull it to the left until the histogram begins to show some value information.

By doing this, you are telling photoshop to turn the darkest value in your image (former that bit of dark grey) into a black black (remember, blackest black is indicated by the black arrow). Likewise on the right side, you’re saying, “Hey, Photoshop! Would you mind turning that light grey into a white white?” And you do that by dragging the white arrow (the indicator of whitest white) to the point of your image that contains some value information. Easy enough, right?

Well, now that you’ve moved the black and white value points of your image, the last step in the levels process is to move your mid-tones. “But where should I move my mid-tones?” you might ask. At this point, you’re on your own. Yes, seriously. However, much like the rest of this process, it’s not as frightening as you may initially think. If you look at your image, you’ll probably be able to see if it is too dark, too light, or just right. My image looked pretty dark. If that’s the case, move your mid-tone arrow to the left to brighten the mid-tones of your image. If your image is too light, move it the opposite direction.

Settle on a point for the mid-tones that looks good to you. I usually move my midtone arrow quickly to the left and right just to get a quick feel for what is wrong (too light and too dark), which helps me commit to a happy medium. Here’s a goldie locks example of the levels adjustments for this image:

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Occasionally you’ll have elements in your photograph that you wish weren’t there. Take, for example, this next comparison. In the “before” picture you’ll see a taped-together background with a bunch of seams, an unsightly shadow on the left side of the book, and if you look closely there’s even a faint circle of grey on the bottom right portion of the image that looks like there may have been a piece of dust on the lens. The after photo shows all these elements magically fixed.

In order to do this I used the clone-stamp and the healing brush tools.

These two tools work very similarly to one another, but before we start talking about their differences, I want to teach you how to use one of them in particular: the clone stamp tool (or as I’ll be calling it, the CST). The CST is actually a little more advanced tool than most Photoshop tools because it requires a two-step process in order to use it. The way the CST works is by painting with an existing area of your canvas, so you’ll need to select an area to paint FROM and an area to paint TO. Let’s make it happen.

The first of two steps is to define the area FROM which you’ll be painting. I would like to paint some of that seamless background on top of the visible seam. To do that, hold down the “alt” key on your keyboard (“option” key on a mac) and with it held down, click the area you’d like to paint FROM.

When you do this, you’ll notice that your cursor turns into a little cross-hair (above). This change is Photoshop’s way if indicating that you are now defining the area from which you’ll be painting. Once you click with your mouse, do me a favor. PUT BOTH HANDS IN THE AIR! I know you’ll feel silly doing it the first time, but this is imperative to the tool functioning properly. I mention this because whenever I teach someone the CST, inevitably they’ll forget about the alt key that is held down or inadvertently keep the mouse button in the down position. By “raising the roof,” you won’t have either of these problems.

Okay, now for the second step. Move your cursor to the area that you’d like to start painting TO. When you click and hold your mouse button, you should now see two cursors: 1) a circle indicating the area TO which you are painting and 2) a cross indicating the area FROM which you are painting. Like this:

A. Use the largest, most feathered-edged (fuzzy) brush possible. This will prevent any visible seam from occurring. Conversely, if you used a hard-edged brush, you will likely see the brush line. Not the case with a feathered-edged brush. If you are accidentally painting unwanted areas of your canvas, then your brush is probably too big. Size it down a bit and try again.

B. Sample from various parts of the image. If you sample (define your area from which you are painting) only once, you run the risk of repainting the same element multiple times. This does not look natural. In order to prevent that repeated look, simply alt-click (option-click on a mac) to redefine a different area to paint from (in my case, I would choose another area of blank background), then move your cursor back to the same place you were painting before. Randomness looks natural. Repeated elements leave an unsightly photoshop thumbprint on your image. Your goal is to make it look as though you were never there.

C. Match your gradients. If you look at the curved, blank-paper, background, you’ll see that there is a subtle gradient. It starts out as a light grey on the top and progresses toward a darker grey at the bottom. This is important to recognize when using the CST because if I want to clone blank paper on top of that seam, I need to find an area of the canvas that is the same gradient color to paint on top of that seam. If I define the starting area of my CST as a color that is too light (or too high on this particular picture) or too dark (lower on this image), then it will look out of place. Do your best to define your starting point in an area that is similar in color and value.

D. Match the edge of your brush with the edge of your object. This final CST tip is one I’ll discuss further on the next full-fledged tip, as it requires a bit more explanation. Hang tight for just a moment as I wrap up this CST and Healing Brush Tool (HBT) discussion.

Alright, so you’ve got some tips to think about when clone-stamping, but I promised you an explanation on the HBT. Okay, fine, since you asked nicely. Grab your HBT and bring it onto your canvas. In order to use this tool, do the EXACT SAME THING I outlined above for the CST (1. define your starting area with an alt-click [option-click for mac], 2. put your hands in the air, 3. move cursor to a new area, 4. start painting on that new area by holding your mouse button down and dragging). It should look something like this:

It looks pretty similar to the CST, right? Well, the above image is what the HBT looks like AS YOU ARE USING it. Once you let go of the mouse button, it thinks for a second before it shifts to something like this:

The change is subtle, but you can see that the healing brush does its best to BLEND with whatever pixel data was there originally. In the first image, you saw the seam between the light grey and the dark grey. Once the HBT works its magic, it creates that blend. Now before you quick reading and consider yourself a HBT convert, let me show you a little more about it. While it does work similarly to the CST, it’s results are less predictable. Let’s try using our HBT moving toward the right in this same area:

As you know from the prior explanation, this image (above) shows the HBT AS YOU ARE USING it. Now let’s take a look at what happens when you release your mouse button:

YEESH! Not quite the seamless transition we were hoping for. The HBT works best with healing a predominantly uniform area. I’ve also found it works better with a hard-edged brush than a soft-edged brush.

The bottom line is, while the CST and the HSB both have their strengths, they also have their drawbacks. The CST is more predictable (because the result does not change from the preview), however it requires you to be more precise with your initial starting area. The HBT requires less precision (as it will do its best to blend with the existing pixel data), however occasionally it will give you unpredictable and unwanted results. Do not become wed to either tool, rather, become acquainted with their strengths and weaknesses, and use each to their best outcome. I used a combination of both to get rid of the seams, shadows, and lens dust in the photo above.

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This is an odd little concept that has served me well over the years. It’s the reason why your baby sister’s collages made from magazine clippings cut with scissors don’t look very realistic. Basically, if you look at a photograph, the edges of the objects are never perfectly sharp. Let’s take a closer look at this one:

You’ll see that even though the edges look pretty sharp when you look at the whole image, there is actually a few pixels worth of feathering (fuzziness). While our naked eye may not pick up on those subtleties, they become painfully apparent when something SHARP creates and edge around somethings SOFT, like a hard-edged brush in Photoshop that cuts out an object with softer edges…or your baby sister’s scissors cutting out photographic images from a magazine.

You can apply this same concept in Photoshop. Let’s take a look at that shadow on the left side of my book.

If we tried to clone-stamp away the shadow with a hard-edged brush, the book would look like it was cut-out with a pair of scissors. Click the image to get a better look.

We need a softer edged brush to remove the shadow. However, this is another instance in which you can go too far. If you simply select one of the soft-edged brush presets, chances are it will be TOO feathered (MORE fuzzy than the edge of your object. That’s not good either:

You are striving for a brush edge which matches the edge of your object. In order to achieve an edge that is custom-feathered to your object’s edge, click in the brush options drop-down menu and move the hardness slider to your desired fuzziness:

Once you create a brush edge that matches your subject’s sharpness, your digital corrections should start to look a lot more natural.

Finally, the title of this tip is “Match edge of product with edge of brush/selection/mask.” I just showed you the most basic method of matching edges and how that can create realistic alterations in your product photography. However, if you are a little more comfortable in photoshop and know a thing or two about selections and layer masks, the same principle applies: create a selection or mask edge that matches the edge of your object. Your results should be equally dandy.

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The first tip at the beginning of this post told you to work at the highest possible resolution, and I stand by that statement. If your camera’s highest quality is 14 megapixels, keep your file at that resolution while you work. It will give you the greatest amount of detail and precision while working. However, once you are done digitally manipulating your product photography, it will need to be delivered in a number of different sizes. First, before resizing your image, save your newly completed, high-resolution image. You can always come back to this image and size it down to whatever you need, but as I mentioned above, it is a bad idea to increase the resolution of an image. If you’re unfamiliar with the Photoshop environment, we’ll be resizing our images via the Image Size dialogue box, which can be found via the Image menu -> Image Size…

A couple of main sizes for images are web and print resolution. Talking about resolution in terms of strict DPI (dots per inch) can become arbitrary and confusing if we don’t know the physical size of the image, so I’ll be listing recommended pixel dimensions instead of DPI. If you are interested in providing a 4″x6″ print-resolution file to publications that may print your product photograph, you’ll want to downsize your image to roughly 1800 x 1200 pixels. Now that you resized your image, save another version of your file, only this time name it something different, indicating that this is the new 4″x6″ print-resolution file. After you have a print-resolution file saved, let’s downsize once again for the web. We don’t need to see your 14-megapixel image on your website. For a large website image, an 800 x 600 pixel image (about 0.5 megapixels) should be just fine. Generally speaking, this web-image size is large enough to see detail, but low-resolution enough so that people can’t do a whole lot with your image if they were to steal it. Prints from these kinds of images are certainly sub-par, so a thief would certainly have a rough time convincing anyone that they produced the image. Of course, once you’ve resized your photo to web-resolution, save yet another file under a different name that indicates this is your 800 x 600 pixel, web-resolution, file.

Another great reason for downsizing your product photography from a grand resolution to a modest one is that it allows for a greater margin of error. By this, I’m referring to the slight imperfections in the digital manipulations we’ve accomplished up until this point. Just for example, let’s think back to the clone stamp tool and how we tried got rid of that unsightly shadow. When we did that, there were likely some slight imperfections, usually along the edge of the object. These minor imperfections become less and less noticeable the smaller (lower resolution) the image becomes. I bring up this topic just to reassure you that even though a high-resolution can seem unforgiving, don’t fret too much since your images will likely become a lot smaller and the imperfections less noticeable.

Alright, that does it for another round of Small Press Professionalism. I hope you’ve found this entry helpful and if you have any additional tips or suggestions, please post them in the comments section below. As always, there are plenty more Small Press Professionalism articles located on the Resources page of this website. Thanks for reading!